Perhaps you’ve been one of the 30,000 annual visitors to the Treworgy Farm to visit their famous corn maze, pick apples, pluck bright orange pumpkins and enjoy amazing fresh-made donuts from the family gift shop. And right after Thanksgiving, you can go for Christmas trees and horse-drawn carriage rides. Treworgy’s is becoming a Maine family annual bucket list experience, but it wasn’t always that way. The video from the University of Maine Cooperative Extension tells the story of the farm.
“I had no experience at growing trees,” Gary Treworgy said when asked about how the farm got its start. “I’d read — and you can read all you want — but until you do it, you really don’t quite get it.”
Gary and his wife Patty started the farm in 1984 when they planted 1400 semi-dwarf trees, but they all died. Not being the kind of family to give up on their dreams, they pushed on and grew their small farm into the successful farm that sees between 30,000 and 50,000 visitors each year.
The University of Maine Cooperative Extension created this short documentary above as part of a video series called “Growing Maine” to bring people closer to farmers and producers, to better understand the human dimension of agriculture.
UMaine Extension plans to release more videos. Have a story idea? View previous stories and send in your suggestions here.